CPMag | Curated by Nicola Lees, Over You / You, the program of the 31st Biennial of Graphic Arts in Ljubljana, Slovenia will bring together a group of international artists addressing the history of the printmaking and the formal and sociopolitical characteristics associated with the medium. The exhibition will reflect on the Biennial’s history as a radical site for the distribution of images that made art available to a wide audience, rather than examining it as a presentation of traditional printmaking techniques. Many of the artists are influenced by projects shown at previous Biennials.
Image: Pilar Quientores, Cathedral of Freedom, 2015, commissioned by the 31st Biennial of Graphic Arts, Ljubljana 2015
Over You / You will include new commissions by artists exploring the limits of traditional print mediums, such as woodcut, screen printing and etching, as well as artists focusing on the tools of reproduction that drive transmission and distribution. The program for the 31st Biennial of Graphic Arts Ljubljana will feature over 40 projects by international and local artists. These will include an exhibition at The Jakopic Gallery by Giles Round (b. 1976), looking back at the Biennial through the lens of Robert Rauschenberg’s 1963 contribution Accident, a work widely considered to be the first Pop Art print.
Giles Round, Documentation from the installation of the International Biennial of Graphic Art, Ljubljana, 1969, Courtesy: Moderna galerija, Ljubljana
A historical trajectory also animates a new production by Oscar Murillo (b. 1986), which will track 20th century printmaking biennials in the global south, specifically the political relevance of Colombia’s 1970 Bienal de Medellín, which acted as a platform for the dissemination of knowledge in the face of the threat of a political coup. A close reading of avant-garde histories in Ljubljana and elsewhere will be addressed by Istvan Ist Huzjan (b.1981) whose research around Mirror in Landscape, 1969 by David Nez (OHO Group) will uncover the way in which the Ljubljana Biennial has operated as a gateway for cross-border communication and exchange.
The central gallery of the Museum of Modern Art will present exhibition of Andrea Büttner (b. 1972), with a new series of woodcuts, one of the earliest means developed for creating mass-produced images, which in Büttner’s work is tied to notions of labor and self-expression.
Andrea Büttner, Grid, 2012, woodcut, 115 x 173 cm image size, © Andrea Büttner / VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2015, courtesy Hollybush Gardens, London and David Kordansky Gallery, Los Angeles
The Gallery of Cankarjev Dom will present an exhibition by winner of the 30th Biennial of Graphic Arts Grand Prix María Elena González, curated by Bozidar Zrinski. Other collaborations will include an editorial project with Mousse Publishing and projects with MoTA (Museum of Transitory Art) and AVA (Academy of Visual Arts), Ljubljana.
source: MGLC Ljubljana
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